6 Energy-Boosting Snacks to Stash in Your Work Desk

A healthy lifestyle doesn’t happen overnight. It requires small but consistent efforts to get to where you want to be in terms of health. To achieve that, you need to incorporate small but effective routines into your daily life. That way, you don’t think of these as separate entities but something you can blend seamlessly into your routine.

A simple but effective way to establish healthy routines is to store fresh, healthy, energy-boosting brainfood snacks in your work desk. You spend around 10 hours at your workplace, after all; even if you hit the gym for an hour every day, if you engage in unhealthy habits at work, those gym-gathered health benefits won’t be worth squat.

The next time you head to the supermarket, place these 6 energy-boosting snacks into your cart for you to store in your workstation.

1. Raw nuts

Raw nuts are one of the healthiest and most convenient snacks around, with great health benefits to boot. They’re often packed in convenient containers or packages, so it’s a breeze to bring and store them at work.

For starters, go for almonds or cashews. A handful helps you feel full but not heavy, and tides you over for a few hours.

2. Air-popped popcorn

Who says you can’t enjoy junk food while on the road to a healthier lifestyle? Air-popped popcorn is one treat you can still help yourself to even if you’ve decided to shun carbohydrates, sodium, and processed foods.

Just make sure you don’t add any salt or butter to your fare. For seasoning, you can use cinnamon, cumin, turmeric, or red pepper flakes.

3. Dark chocolate

Another energy-boosting snack staple to stash in your work desk: dark chocolate! See, going down the healthy route can be a happy, satisfying experience.

Just make sure to eat in portions, though, and not the entire bar in one sitting. Amp up the healthy quotient by picking high-quality dark chocolate that has a cacao content of 70% or higher.

A few squares should tide you over throughout the day. Eat slowly and thoughtfully to relish the chocolate’s rich flavor.

4. Dried fruit

Those with a sweet tooth will feel they’re not missing out on anything when they stash dried fruit in their work desk. As with nuts and seeds, dried fruit is easily found in most supermarkets and packaged conveniently, so you can take it with you wherever you go.

Portion out the servings so you don’t end up consuming an entire bag. Look out for packages that have additional sugar; you don’t want to overload on the sugar content here.

5. Plain oatmeal

Oatmeal is touted as one of the healthiest foods there is. Fortunately, they come in bags and packets that are convenient to tote around and stash in most desks.

Store oatmeal packets in your work drawers, and have a hearty, handy snack on hand for when the hunger pangs strike. Simply add some water and microwave the oatmeal in a mug, and you’re good to go.

For added flavor, sprinkle some dried fruit or raw nuts on top of your oatmeal.

6. DIY trail mix

What do you do when you can’t decide which snacks to stash in your work desk? Why, throw them all in, of course, and come up with a DIY trail mix!

Most packages of trail mix in the supermarket contain high levels of sugar and salt, ingredients you wouldn’t want in your healthy-snacks storage. Do away with these by creating your own. Simply throw in your nuts, dried fruit, seeds, oatmeal, and the like to come up with a mix uniquely your own.